Potential risk factors for delinquency in the Japanese context: Findings from Osaka male youths

Efforts have been made to identify risk factors for youth offending. Studying dichotomous risk factors has several advantages: they make it easy to interpret interaction effects, to identify individuals with multiple risk factors, and to communicate results to a broader audience. Few English language studies have examined risk factors for Japanese youth offending. The present research is based on 637 male youths in Osaka. The results show that four risk factors are particularly related to delinquency and deviance: low parental monitoring, peer delinquency, high risk-taking, and low achievement. These four potential risk factors are similar to risk factors found in longitudinal studies in the USA and the UK. Implications for the prevention of delinquency in Japan are drawn.